


Voracious

by stepOnMeZenos



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Gen, Quintuple Drabble
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-01
Updated: 2019-09-01
Packaged: 2020-10-05 04:37:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20482997
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stepOnMeZenos/pseuds/stepOnMeZenos
Summary: Varis receives a report of Zenos' conduct, much to his dismay.





	Voracious

The report looked perfectly innocent as it lay on Varis' desk, the sole remaining paperwork to be looked at for the day. It had come in the same type of envelope as any other report might have. Nothing about it seemed out of the ordinary. 

Unfortunately, Varis knew very well who had sent it and what it contained. The nondescript name on the envelope was all he needed to see.

He leaned back in his chair, sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. The spies he had placed in Zenos' retinue (of whom Zenos was almost certainly aware) were meticulous about sending regular reports, which was, of course, the entire _point_ of employing them, and yet he found himself increasingly wishing he had never taken this step.

These reports _never_ brought good news, and he could frankly do without a step-by-step relay of his foolish son's latest escapades. 

On the other hand, perhaps Zenos had picked a pointless fight with another legatus and killed him in battle… _again._. One never knew with him and his voracious bloodlust. 

He used the letter opener (inherited from the first emperor, which explained the excessive amount of ornaments on it) and sliced through the envelope. Only three pages this time. Three pages couldn't contain anything too horrible, right? There would not be a scandal threatening to fracture the empire in those pages again, right? 

As always, the first page contained a list of deaths that Zenos had not been supposed to cause. It was mercifully short, this time: a suspicious death that had 'Zenos' written all over it, but at least he had had the decency to obscure the evidence for once. A skirmish with rebels that Zenos had been supposed to captured, but the situation had gotten out of hand and there had been no survivors… less than ideal, but nothing he needed to cover up. They were rebels, nobody cared about them. A dead servant… business as usual. 

Good. Zenos hadn't killed anyone important. 

A detailed breakdown of Zenos' activities during the previous week followed. Plenty of the usual sitting-and-staring-at-walls (why Zenos did that all the time Varis had never quite figured out, and he was not about to ask now). He hadn't gone out much outside of his assigned responsibilities; excellent, the less Zenos did outside of his quarters, the fewer opportunities he had to wreak havoc. It really looked as if everything was…

He flipped to the next page and buried his face in his hands, but the words 'has entered the viceroy's menagerie and proceeded to slaughter all of its inhabitants' were already burned into his mind. 

It had been _so_ close to an uneventful week, by Zenos' standards. So, so close. But of course, his idiot son wouldn't be so nice to him. Of course he would pile more work on him.

With another sigh, he reached for pen and paper and began drafting an entirely insincere letter of apology to the viceroy.

Business as usual, indeed.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments appreciated!


End file.
